


like mercy on a death row

by ultraviolence



Series: i have immortal longings in me (faeverse) [1]
Category: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016), Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fae, F/M, Fade to Black, Fluff and Angst, Mutual Pining, Outdoor Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-09
Updated: 2017-03-09
Packaged: 2018-10-01 15:36:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,751
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10193153
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ultraviolence/pseuds/ultraviolence
Summary: "If he had a heart, he would be in love with her already, all strangeness and bright fire." // The story of Orson Krennic and the strange girl with stardust in her eyes. Fae AU.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I fully blame [this guy here](http://genmaximilianveers.tumblr.com/) for the AU idea. Title & a specific line, "I want to flirt with your secrets" from [my lovely friend's poem](http://maelinoe.tumblr.com/), used with her express permission (please do check out her writing). 
> 
> Enjoy!

The first time he met the strange girl with stardust in her eyes, it was two days after Midsummer.

Magic was still strong in the air, a tangible current, the Summer Court’s power coming into its annual crescendo, and the mortals were doing whatever they can to keep the Fair Folk at bay. Half of them are praying, to their god or to their father’s gods, while the rest took other precautions. A couple of them, either the truly foolish or truly wise, chose to forgo everything altogether, placing themselves in Fate’s whimsical, unpredictable hands.

Of course, it does them no good, all those things.

There was no Wild Hunt that night, no grandeur, no celebration of the most savage kind, no King and Queen of the Court. There was only him, his loyal pack of wolves, and his personal retinue, riding into the approaching twilight. The veil was still at its thinnest, and the last of the sun’s blood was fading beneath the horizon as his hunting party reached the mortal world.

The air is heavier here. His wolves fanned out, an extension of his already acute senses, scouting the forest for either game, lost mortals, or threats. Near a clearing, they sensed something.

Krennic chose to wait, hands gripped tight on the reins of his steed, listening. The wolves are communicating with each other, sending possible answers and receiving questions in form of rough images. They were apprehensive at first, and the two nearest to him—his favourites, a young male and a grizzled older female, ghastly white in the gloom—began to  walk ahead of him, half-running, and he could sense their curiosity. There was something, ahead in the clearing. He sent them a question—a simple _what_ —but their answer was inconclusive.

Their curiosity contagious, he dismounted, following his wolves into the clearing. If he had a heart—if he _still_ had a heart—he’d probably be afraid. But his kind had little to be afraid of.

There was a Faerie Ring in the midst of the clearing, and, near it, a mortal girl, asleep.

She wasn’t especially stunning or breathtaking, as mortals go, at least in her state of unconsciousness, and her age was a question he wasn’t bothering to solve—rarely does it matter, to his kind—but there was something about her, a familiar quality that Krennic couldn’t quite place. He strode forward, resuming his nearly unbroken pace, ghostly white cape sweeping behind him, black leather boots making no sound as it meets soft grass. His wolves followed suit, flanking him—the male on his left, the older female on his right—while the others hid themselves behind the trees, streaks of white in the darkening twilight.

The male started growling. He stopped, for a fraction of a second, tilting his head slightly in its direction. Krennic asked a wordless question. The beast answered, _she’s awake_. 

It was too late for any glamour, but he wasn’t especially concerned about that. He was more concerned about how she managed to trick _him_ into thinking that she’s asleep. She was on her feet already, her eyes definitely that of a woman’s, alert and ready, watching his every move. Awake, she was animated by a strange fire, an odd girl in a man’s clothes, her dark hair framing her face.

She doesn’t show any fear.

His kind was feared for a number of reasons, all of them more deserving than the last. Encounters like this usually doesn’t end well—to the mortal. Especially when a Fae Lord’s interest was piqued.

And Krennic was most definitely _intrigued_.

He met her gaze straight on, not disadvantaged in the least. She was either extremely foolish or oddly wise to seek his gaze (the two things are often one and the same, something that mortals somehow had difficulty understanding), to _meet_ it—he could think of a number of unpleasant things that he could do to her, without barely lifting a finger. She did not waver, and he slowly began to circle her, his two nearest wolves now flanking her.

She barely blink, her slender form ready, watching him in turn. He waited for her to speak, to break the spell containing them in the moment.

“Yours are not hunting dogs,” She said, either astutely or just stating the obvious, breaking the silence. She was still not taking her eyes off his, although it doesn’t escape his attention that her gaze flickered, for a moment, to his exposed ears, sharp and inhuman. He made no effort to hide it.

“No. Wolves. Far from ordinary _dogs_ ,” He told her, amusement bleeding slightly into his voice. He’d stopped pacing, and the she-wolf had started growling, hostility barely caged. He caught her breaking their eye contact to glance at the female, still growling—a wary glance—but she quickly resumed it, dark eyes hooded.

“As far away from each other as you and me,” She remarked, seamlessly picking up the thread from where he dropped it. He doesn’t expect her to pick up so quickly. Krennic raised an eyebrow, fascinated.

“Smart child,” He observed, clasping his gloved hands together in front of him. He wondered if she’d turn tail now and run. He wondered if she’d pounce. Most of all, he wondered if she’d stand her ground. “You wanted something.”

She tilted her head then, prey-not-quite, her expression still unreadable. “Why would you assume that?”

Questions after questions. That’s all the mortals ever did, giving birth to one question after another, never quite satisfied with themselves, or what they received. They doomed themselves endlessly through their own discontent, their own restlessness. But the strange girl was something else, steel holding up her spine, stardust in her gaze.

“You wouldn’t be _here_ otherwise.” He let a mild snarl slip, not bothering to point out the obvious. No sane mortal would sleep near a Faerie Ring after Midsummer, much less _think_ about it. Of course, there are exceptions, usually those with an artful disposition, always seeking such things as inspiration. Some of them—the luckiest ones—ended up with more than they bargained for. Two of them was currently flanking him, the others concealed by the forest. 

It is always wise to keep the most interesting ones as pets. They were more useful that way.

“No,” She retorted, as casually as putting out a flame, “I didn’t want anything.”

He smiled, tightly, coldly. It wasn’t entirely a lie, but he wasn’t interested in that. He was interested in _her_.

“Maybe we’ll find out,” He says, evenly. “Why don’t you step into the Ring? I promise I wouldn’t hurt you.”

A lie doesn’t become less of a lie when you put it in a pretty clothing, and he’d certainly orchestrated more elaborate tricks before. Different mortals needed different modes of persuasion. It was something of a challenge to determine hers, but sometimes the simplest, most classic form is the best.

“You can try,” She challenged, a never-unheard-of-before answer, already shifting her stance. It frankly both astonished and galled him—she was just a girl, a mortal girl, yet she stood there, alone, near a site of Faerie power, during the time when his Court’s magic runs strong. None of it adds up. None of it makes any sense.

The grizzled she-wolf leapt forward, then, all menace and grace, before Krennic could say anything, but the girl reacted just as fast. There’s a glint of steel, a whirl of movement, and a moment later, the wolf backs away with a gash near her right hind leg, snarling. The mortal girl stood, ready, blade in hand. He instinctively took a step backward, not because of the knife, but because of what it was made of. He wondered how such a thing could have escaped his notice.

“No one has ever done that before,” He observed, getting his temper under control with a lot of difficulty. She was spoiling for a fight, like his wolves, like _him_ , but Krennic did not want to give it to her. Not yet.

“I could do the same to you,” She then told him, a threat barely veiled, barely dressed in anything to cover its nakedness, the open wound of it. She did not bother to wipe or sheathe her knife, unashamed in her honesty. The male wolf circled her, wary. 

He regarded the girl keenly, neither in a benevolent nor malevolent manner, but with a certain detached fascination. He thought about the wolf: she will most definitely heal, and besides there are others. But the girl…there was something deeply intriguing about her, a riddle waiting to be solved. Most importantly, she was surrounded, he imagined, by an aura of strange familiarity, like he’d known her somewhere before, but couldn’t remember.

If he had a heart, he would have said that her eyes reminded her of a certain old lover. He didn’t know why or how—mortal questions—and he didn’t care about finding out, not unless it became absolutely relevant, but he felt in him a growing fascination, a dangerous obsession.

She was waiting. He looked her in the eye, treading carefully. The pack howled in the distance. 

“What do you want?” He finally asked, his tone almost sincere. Almost human.

The girl did not immediately answer, but let his question hang in the air between them. She was regarding him in her own manner, thinking, considering his question, and other things that he did not care enough to speculate about.

He waited. She sheathed her iron knife.

“The question should be what do _you_ want?” She shot back, and he narrowed his eyes at her. It was beyond insolent, beyond infuriating, and he could think of a thousand different ways to punish her for that. But his growing obsession with her stayed his hand, and instead, he turned her question in his mind like a strange object, trying to make heads or tails of it, trying to determine the best way to respond.

“Come with me,” Krennic said, at last after a certain amount of silence, the night thickening around them. It was unthinkable of him to _ask_ , certainly below his standing, and offensive to what he is, but different mortals required different modes of persuasion, and she is certainly of a very different sort than the rest. Here, he felt something else, something that he did not give a name, for fear of what it’d do to him: he wanted her. 

“Only if you’d promise me that you’re going to return me to this place, tomorrow, at dawn.” She easily said, as if she’d practised this conversation a thousand times before. As if she’d dreamt of them meeting on a forest clearing in a night like this before. He wondered how it ends. How it _will_ end.

She was outsmarting him at every turn, a fox eluding pursuit. There must be a loophole  somewhere, a place for him to lay down his traps and wait until she stepped on them, but Krennic wasn’t sure if his fascination prevented him from finding it, or if he was after something else, blinded by something else entirely. He tried to mask his annoyance, and failed, spectacularly. 

He gave her his assent, what she wanted, and the strange mortal girl smiled, showing no teeth. Only then did she told him yes, and only then did she come with him, trudging after him into the night.

If he had a heart, he would wonder which one of them are more foolish.

* * *

The night rises, continued its spread like a deadly disease, dark grace arching against the horizon. 

The strange girl was unafraid when he took her back to where the hunting party was waiting, restless, baleful, immortal in their savagery. The first mortal that night, fresh blood, she would be too insightful to not know what they wanted to do to her, what they collectively _craved_ , and Krennic shared their excitement, understood the heart of it. This was a Hunt, and the revelry had just started.

There was nothing to be said as he mounted his steed, a Faerie horse of pure onyx, a creature of flame and air instead of earth and dust, as with all the graceful, unearthly horses of the Fae. The party instinctively understood that the girl is _his_. The leader of the pack always claimed the first bite. Here, Krennic fully expected the girl to try to recant her words, to wiggle her way out of the bargain, as he extended a gloved hand to her to help her up. Mortals always does.

The strange girl stared up at him, her expression as indecipherable as the night sky, the flecks in her eyes resembled the dust of stars. She looked like she was about to say something, and he waited, a little impatiently, already wanting to get on with this. She was obviously a difficult one, but Krennic always loved a challenge most of all. It was perhaps his personal downfall.

“I’m Liana,” She says, always the unexpected sort, defiantly ignoring his hand and deftly climbed up on her own, “You didn’t ask.”

He knows a lie when he heard one, or perhaps it was the way her breath hitches a little after the final syllable, but he doesn’t care. It was quite probably the wisest thing she had done that entire night, despite the mad, contradictive logic underlying her behaviour: she let him look her in the eyes, met his gaze head-on, yet she kept her own true name safe, hoarded close to her heart, like a dragon guarding her treasure. She had something of the Fair Folk in her, and it unsettles him a little.

“I didn’t need to. You were going to tell me.” He said, not bothering to look back, banking his irritation of her refusing him point-blank for the second time that night. He couldn’t determine whether she’s extremely foolish or extremely wise. Perhaps she defies that sort of categorisation altogether. If he had a heart, he would worry, but as it stands, the night is still young, and the Hunt must go on. Grasping the reins, he urged his steed to go.

The forest blurs, merging with the night and the stars and the cries of the wolves, and the girl fell silent for a while, her hands grasping the back of his cape lightly. She was thinking, that much is obvious, and he let her—desiring not mindless chatter nor casual companionship—instead letting his mind touch his pack’s, focusing on finding game.

“You didn’t tell me yours.” She suddenly expressed, breaking his focus. Again, Krennic felt irritation rising in his chest, but it was accompanied by the dark intrigue that kept taunting him, the fascination that led him down this path. 

“I have a lot of names,” He led them around a bend, sensing the _urgency_ in his wolves that could only mean that there was game ahead, to be hunted, to be chased, to be killed. He egged his steed on.

“Which one would you deem worthy of me?”

He could feel his lips curling up into a smile, despite the not-so-subtle sarcasm in her words, and he considered it for a moment, as the chase begins. “Krennic. Orson Krennic.”

He didn't know why he handed her that piece of him in particular, something of what he used to be and in some ways still is. She’s playing a game with her lie, and he certainly could do better, but he was never that good at playing someone else’s game. He preferred to change the rules altogether.

And he thinks— _felt_ —perhaps foolishly, that it would be safe with her. Perhaps it had something to do with her eyes, the aura of imagined familiarity. Perhaps it was other qualities that she possessed, or that he perceived that she possessed. It doesn’t matter.

In all the ways love will and has doomed him, this one is surely the worst.

The girl did not say anything to that, and she was silent afterwards, even as they saw the glimpse of the stag ahead, leaping over fallen branches, the wolves in harmonious pursuit. The party itself has broken up, lending their own rendition of the chase, and Krennic forgets everything as the thrill of the hunt filled him, drowned him, turned him into more than the sum of what he is.

He felled the killing blow, not much later, and she followed him, ever-watchful, keeping her own secrets safe. The beast fell and his wolves gutted it, merciless.

“You used to be mortal,” She said at some point afterwards, Liana and someone else, someone he did not yet know, while the wolves feasted. The hunting party nowhere to be found for the moment, there was no one else around but the two of them, and the forest cast a particular kind of silence.

It wasn’t quite a question, yet not quite a statement, either, nor an innocent piece of observation. It was startling, certainly, but he affected a nonchalant look.

“Where did you come to that conclusion?” Krennic asked, his true burning curiosity safely veiled and stashed away, eyes fixed on her. It was almost poetic, the way she looked at him, the symphony of blood and guts going on in the backdrop. He could sense that she was hiding something from him, something else, not just her true name. It was perhaps what motivates her. 

“I don’t know,” The girl who called herself Liana answered, furrowing her brow, shrugging lightly. “I just know. Maybe it’s your eyes.”

It was a highly ambiguous statement—certainly evasive—not quite flattering but not quite offensive either, another riddle to be solved. In the gloom of the forest, in the company of wolves and silence, he was suddenly overcome with the strangest desire to touch his lips to her, for a taste of that fire. Her eyes at the same time belonged to her and someone from his past, a man whose name he had tried to burn out of his mind.

Before he could act, before he could reach out to her and close the distance between them, she turned away, a phantom, slipping away from his grasp, and the moment ends.

“You’re a strange one,” He told her, as they made their way back, mounting his horse. The wolves are sated for the time being. Her grip on his hand—she did not refuse it this time—was oddly strong for someone her size, and ended too soon. 

He could feel her lean forward in response, warm breath on his arm, body pressing against him, all too human, all too perishable. He unconsciously held his breath, waiting in anticipation for something, _anything_ , to happen.

“So are you.” She said, once more making it sound like the most obvious thing in the world, like she got him figured out all along. It felt like they were sharing a secret, despite the gulf between them. It felt like they were old friends. She leaned back, away from him, and Krennic can’t help but felt the slightest bit of disappointment, all too human, all too strange and confusing for him.

If he had a heart, he would be in love with her already, all strangeness and bright fire.

* * *

Later that night, he took her to Faerie, that other realm, the infamous world beyond madness, beyond mortal comprehension. He did not took her in far, did not bother to try and impress her as most of his kind would have, did not try to trick her into entering bargains that she couldn’t get out of. It was a very much tempting possibility, but he wanted to figure her out most of all, to unwrap a little of that enigma, and if she consented to go to bed with him at some point, that would be a gift he wouldn’t refuse.

Thus, it was to his cottage and not his primary residence that he took her, not far from the border. He summarily did what a good host would do: sit them down for dinner, and offered her the finest wine. To his astonishment, and indeed annoyance (routine at this point), she refused both, instead opting to eat her own food and drink her own water from a small satchel she’d been carrying.

“It’d be foolish to eat Faerie food.” She told him, seemingly having no qualms whatsoever to do so, by way of explanation. With any other mortal company, he’d trick them them into it, or at least try, but if there’s something that Krennic had already learnt about her, it’s that she seemed to respond better to _human_ gestures.

He could be sincere and direct if that’s what it takes. Here, he casually leaned back on his seat, nursing a glass of wine, observing her keenly.

“You might be too clever for your own good,” He said, feeling as if he was waiting for something to happen, waiting for an opening that he could slip through. Maybe she knows. Maybe she doesn’t. He doesn’t really care.

“Maybe. Or it might be that you need new tricks.” She suggested, her gaze challenging. He wondered, briefly, where they’d be when this night ends. The open-ended nature of that gave him a certain kind of thrill. 

“That’s a bold statement.” He then said, regarding her curiously, despite the sharpness underlying his words. She did not immediately respond, but observed him for what felt like the longest time. He waited, not feeling inclined to make the first move—considering just how unpredictable she can be—and then, much to his surprise, she rose up from her seat at the other end of the table, making her way over to him. She moved with a certain purpose, a peculiar animal grace, carrying herself cautiously, but without excess fear. 

Through it all, her oddly flecked eyes darted to and fro, shifting in the light, shining with a light of its own, a light that was not forest fire, not wildfire, but a steady flame. Krennic leaned forward ever so slightly, captivated.

It felt like time has come to a halt—although time passes differently for him—as she moved across the room, but she reached him, at last, and he tilted his head towards her, a captive audience. Her fingers—rough and calloused, a survivor’s hands—found his face, fingertips grazing his jaw softly. He tried to read her eyes, tried to find lust or admiration or awe there, or even naked curiosity, but there was too much and not enough in those stardust eyes.

“I’ve never kissed anyone like you before,” Her tone was nimble, evasive, a little like her fingertips on his jawline. A little like how she fights, in the clearing. It was a statement,  strangely, instead of a coy come-on. He felt both thrill and desire, entwined, rising inside him, a different sort of hunt. A different sort of conquering. She wasn’t a phantom now nor a mystery, she was close enough to touch, close enough to kiss, close enough to kill. He wanted nothing more than to own that distance and taste her at the end of it, as he always does with mortals, but she was a different kind of mortal, a different kind of game. If she was prey at all.

“Then this is perhaps your lucky day,” He taunted her in turn, affecting carelessness, keeping a short leash on his own want, his own need. He gambled that she’d be reckless enough to try and kiss him. The strange girl pulled him forward, then, calloused hands on his face, her lips finding his. He felt his own _need_ coursing through him when their lips met, almost taking over completely, and it makes him feel dizzy. It makes him feel truly reckless. She pulled back first—curiosity has perhaps sated—or almost managed to, but he caught her again, hissing softly against her mouth, free hand gripping her by the shoulder. His kiss wasn’t in any way as chaste as hers. It was passion, pure and simple, and he tilted his head, to feel her better, drinking her in.

She bit his bottom lip after a short while, not enough to draw blood, but enough to give her momentum to pull away.

Her eyes were wild in the aftermath, like a wildcat his wolves cornered once during a full moon, and he smiled.

“You should be careful of what you wish for,” He told her, smugly, triumphant. Anger flickered in her eyes—the first time since the clearing—and he knows that he’d managed to exploit the opening that falls into his lap. Still, he wondered what she’s going to do next. _If_ she’s going to try and land a scratch, like what she did to his wolf.

She regarded him, eyes blazing, almost incandescent. 

“You’re a monster,” She proclaimed, a wholly uncalled-for sentiment, although not entirely untrue. If she expected the blow to land, it doesn’t. Something ceased to become an insult when you made a reality out of it. “Tell me where my room is.”

Here, he was once again tempted to let her deal with the consequences of displeasing him, of continually inflaming his rage, but once more, his fascination stayed his hand. Affecting a look of indifference, he told her, gave her what she wanted, again, and watched her left the dining room, carrying her fire with her.

It felt much colder when she left.

* * *

She showed up in his personal chamber later on, not long after.

He’d shed his cape and gloves, and was seated behind his desk, reading, when there was a knock on his door. He immediately assumed that it was her. The door opens, magicked to be that way, and the mortal girl was indeed there, a little startled.

Perhaps also a little awkward, in terms of disposition. It was all too easy to assume that she wanted a sexual favor, and she knows that. Krennic looked up from what he was reading, fairly grudgingly, and looked her over, standing in the doorframe like some sort of a stray animal. For the first time that night, she looked a little awe-struck when his gaze found hers, a little electrified. Maybe it finally sunk in about what he _is_ , he thought, wryly. Or maybe it was what happened in the dining room earlier, what had transpired between them.

He let her stood in silence, as he waited for her to supply him with an explanation, or to close the distance between them if she was so inclined. All this staring contest with her always left Krennic feeling more than a little impatient, and he was actually tempted to start demanding. After all, that’s what he usually does.

“I can’t sleep,” She finally said, very helpfully, perhaps a little sulkily, shifting slightly. Of all the possible explanations that he could think about, this one absolutely throws him off-guard. He looked at her, trying to gauge if she was being serious with this.

“I’m not good with children,” He told her, dryly, already itching to go back to what he was doing. She really was a distraction, and a particularly annoying one.

“I’m not that _young_ ,” She retorted, indignant, crossing her arms over her chest. He looked her over, out of spite.

“You all looked the same to me.” He declared, pettily brushing it aside. He usually welcomes distraction, and one of the uses of mortals is that they provide a steady sort of distraction, but Liana, so far, has proven to be more of the sort that other Fae Lords (and Ladies) turned into some sort of animal, her eyes be damned. In fact, this _entire night_ be damned.

“That’s a lazy argument,” She protested, stepping inside, the door closing behind her. His gaze flitted between her and the door for a moment, trying out possible scenarios, out of instinctive habit. She seemed to notice, and fell into silence of her own making for a moment. Hovering between the room at large and the closed entrance, she was a creature of in-betweens, impossible and ethereal. “Besides, you wouldn’t ask me to come if I’m not particularly interesting to you, would you?”

She made her way in after dropping the remark, apparently not having any qualms, either, to sit on the edge of the bed casually—it was there more for aesthetic reasons than functional ones, since Krennic hardly slept—then lie down on it, as if it was hers, hands clasped together behind her head.

He narrowed his eyes at her, annoyed and more than happy to turn her into a particularly ugly animal any moment now, preferably something small and easy to crush. “You assumed too much.”

She tilted her head to look at him, regarding him in that strange, slightly detached manner of hers. “You’re more beautiful when you’re angry.”

It was an odd sort of remark, and he was thrown off-guard once more, taken completely aback. She already looked away, shifting into a more comfortable position on his bed. He stared at her for the longest while, not quite sure how to proceed.

“Aren’t you going to sleep?” She asked, breaking the sudden awkward silence, and Krennic felt glad that she did. 

“I don’t sleep,” He muttered, by way of explanation, hiding his gaze on the page he’d been reading before she arrived. He was not, in any way, a shy person, even in the life before, but for some reason, he felt a tad bit embarrassed by her remark, a completely irrational thing. He felt another sort of anger rising—she’d disturbed the profound order of his life, he thought. First she’d threatened him with her unpredictability, her impossibility. Now she makes him feel _embarrassed,_ an emotion highly unwelcome and almost entirely unprecedented. It was all impossible. It was all nonsense. He no longer had a heart.

“That why your hair is so immaculate?” She was teasing him now, gesturing at him with her chin, and it makes him feel so baffled. Faeries are, by nature, vain creatures, and he was certainly not an exception (not by a long shot), but he had no idea how to deal with mortals who teased him about _it_. 

In fact, he had no idea how to deal with mortals who teased him at all, especially in so casual a manner.

“What is the purpose of all _this_?” He snapped, rising from his seat, angry at himself for letting all this nonsense fly around, in _his_ domain. Most of all, he’s trying to steer this conversation into a more predictable ground—for the sake of his own emotional security, although he obviously won’t ever admit it—or, better yet, eliminate it altogether. “Are you here to _annoy_ me on purpose?”

She smiled, a strange creature sprawled on his bed, icy and sarcastic.

“I wouldn’t dream of it. You’re full enough of yourself as it is. But,” She halted, considering something, eyes on the ceiling and then back to him, “I think you’re lonely. And you’re not at all bad to look at.”

He wasn’t sure how to respond to that, either, and if he was human he would surely laugh. She didn’t wait for his response, didn’t even bother to observe if her words had any effect  on him at all after dropping it. She turned away, her back on him, curling up on herself. 

“Goodnight, Orson,” She told him, suddenly vulnerable, already far away. 

He waited, then, waited until she fell asleep, her breathing soft, waited until he was no longer furious with unsaid things and unwelcome emotions, a maelstrom of unwanted things. He waited until the silence—punctuated by the sound of music in the background, elsewhere, since a party is always underway every night in Faerie—closing in on them, like waves, like the night. 

Then, and only then did he approach her sleeping figure. She looked terribly young in her sleep, and he wondered if she was aware of how much trust she’d put in his hands with this act alone. Perhaps she was trying to prove a point. Perhaps her own reasons were incomprehensible even to her. Krennic watched her, for a moment, the soft rise and fall of her chest, the night in her bones. It stirred something in him, something he’s been trying to forget.

“Goodnight, Liana.” He says, finally, brushing her hair lightly, a flutter of feathers in the realm of her dreams.

If that was even your name, he mused, wondering if he’d ever find out who she truly is.

And if what she said was true, about his loneliness.

* * *

The second time he met her, an entire year has passed, and the wheel of the year once more spinning towards summer, the season of fire, of long nights and stolen kisses. It was Spring, and Krennic was on his way back towards the familiar borders of his Court after nights of revelry in the Spring Court.

He was riding alone, although he had two wolves on his heels, as always, and the moon was almost full.

Then he felt it, felt the familiar flush of a presence, and out of the gloom she came, a creature of the night. He stopped, restraining his wolves with his mind.

“Did you find what you’re looking for?” Krennic asked her as a start, bypassing the social protocol of greetings, since it doesn’t look like she’s going to. He was almost impressed—if she had been looking for him, specifically, she had been either extremely persistent or extremely lucky. There are easier ways to find his sort, specific rituals, all of them constructed with the intention to lure either a specific Faerie out or just about any Fae, most of them more effective than hanging out near the ever-shifting borders of the Courts.

Most of them probably of no use to someone like her. She was silently regarding him, which confirms his suspicion that she was indeed looking for him in particular, and as usual, he waited. It is, by now, a familiar dance.

“I did,” The girl who called herself Liana answered, still with stardust in her eyes, one year older. Still impossible. “I found you.”

He made no move to dismount, nor to walk away, although he let his once-more restless wolves circle her, establishing a perimeter.  

“Well, you have my attention,” He told her. “Speak.”

She held her chin up higher, defiance flickering in her eyes. It was an almost endearing sight. “Not here. Take a walk with me.”

She never ceased to surprise him, but he quickly gathered himself. “I don’t see any reason why I should.”

“You should.” There was a silence, a silence in which he waited, a silence in which he ordered his wolves to withdraw back to his side. “Please.”

She still hasn’t given him any reason, this strange girl, but it was enough to intrigue him.  It was enough to convince him that he’d get a glimpse at the riddle he’d been itching to solve, at last. He dismounted then, looking her square in the eye, assessing her. “Make it worth my while.”

She did not make any promises, but he had a strong feeling that something interesting was going to happen.

* * *

In another clearing, deep into the night, she tried to kill him.

Krennic did not see the act coming, the unsheathing of it, but he saw the glimpse of her blade. He did not think of why, doesn’t really care, already evading her blows—fairly strong, for a mortal, but easy enough to dodge that it doesn’t matter—his body responding with a language of its own. Here, too, was a thrill, and a part of him thrived, rejoiced.

If he had a heart, he’d be concerned about a lot of things, would hesitate, but he’d traded his heart for something else long ago, something more and yet at the same time less. 

He did not bother to return her strikes, instead keeping his temper under check and maneuvered out of her reach.

“This is what you wanted to talk about?” He mocked her, just slightly out of her reach, focusing his gaze on her. She was panting a little, but otherwise still ready to fight, hand gripped tightly on the hilt of her blade. He briefly assessed the odds: completely in his favour, unless she had other cards hidden on her sleeve. “You have to try harder, child.”

She shifted her stance—a fighter through and through, and Krennic momentarily wondered about the forces that shaped her life—and narrowed her eyes at him, obviously waiting for an opening. “You have no idea who I was.”

“Why should I?” He asked, masking his true emotion—confusion—with haughtiness. It seemed to anger her, and he saw her next move before she did. The blade sings, meets empty air, and he is still out of reach.

“Galen Erso,” The mortal girl says, viciously, venom coursing through every syllable, “does that mean anything to you?”

Then, and only then, did he falter, for a fraction of a second, and the girl lunged. Even when he is a moment too late, he is still faster than her, so that her knife only grazed his cheek. It was only a scratch, and superficial nevertheless, but it felt as venomous as her words. Although only half as painful as the memories the name dredged up.

“Who are you?” He spat out, magic crackling in the air around him, but she did not look afraid in the slightest. It infuriated him even _more_.

“His daughter,” The strange girl replied, her eyes blazing. “Jyn. Jyn Erso.”

The pain was searing, flashes of light, disproportionate to its size, but then again, that is what iron did to his kind—slow poison, a slower death. He narrowed his eyes at her, not bothering anymore to mask his fury.

“This is what you want? To kill me?”

He remembered the man she mentioned all too well, the mortal man he fell in love with—and who _left_ him. By nature, it was a relationship doomed to fail, following in the heels of similar lovers in the stories humans told each other, but, like her, he was different. Like her, he was impossible to resist.

Like her, he shines with his own light.

“To avenge him,” Galen’s ghost told him, bright and shining and entirely mad. She had his eyes. “You drove him mad.”

“It’s not my doing,” He countered, matching her fire with his own, spark by spark. “It’s his own doing.”

She lunged again, reckless, a furious wildcat, and Krennic caught her by the wrist. She tried to wrench it free, but he twisted it, eliciting a grunt of pain from her, and she dropped her knife.

He gained the upper hand, but from the look in her eyes, it’s far from over.

“You lie,” She argued, hotly, still trying to break free. “It’s all your sort ever does.”

“Maybe, but it’s none of my concern.” He told her, coldly. _It’s all in the past now_ was something that doesn’t need to be said. If he had a heart he’d tell her _I tried to forget_ , if he had anything resembling a heart at all he’d tell her _I’m sorry_. But he hadn’t had one, even if he felt something that resembles pain.

“That’s where you’re wrong,” Jyn said, all too surprising and yet oddly predictable, kneeing him in the gut. He instinctively loosened his grip on her wrist, and, before he could react, she pulled out another blade from her person, and it found his throat.

Krennic stiffened for a moment, momentarily paralysed by shock and disbelief, but he quickly collected himself.

“Congratulations,” He remarked sarcastically, even as the blade was pressed into his throat, even as the cold iron repulsed him to his very core. “It seems like it’s your lucky day.”

She was close, her breath coming out in short gasps, and he could feel her warmth, smell her sweat, tasted her exhilaration. The distance between them had never been greater.

“And not yours,” She readily parried, and he affected a look of indifference, despite his raging temper. He could still turn this around, easily, if he wanted to, and left her dead in the dirt or worse. He was more than willing to take the risk of another cut, but he wanted to see what Galen’s supposed daughter would do next, how far _she_ would go. A question crossed Krennic’s mind—did he sent her? Possible, but he had not the slightest idea why. As far as he know, Galen was too smart to have a death wish, although he was too curious for his own good.

Here, too, a thrill, as an idea formed itself in his mind: Jyn was on her own, a rogue mission of her own creation.

“What are you waiting for?” He taunted her, feeling her blade pressed harder, cold iron on naked skin. “Do it, Jyn.”

He gambled, this time, that she wouldn’t be reckless enough to do just that, and even if she did, he would be ready for that. The knife stays, a moment passes, the night beasts in the forest going their own way. He could feel his wolves and his mount, somewhere nearby, waiting for their master to return. A brief moment of cruelty: he imagined calling his wolves, and they’d come running in no time, they’d come running and show her the true meaning of savagery, and he’d then teach the insolent mortal child what it means to cross a Fae Lord of the Summer Court.

She stayed his hand. He stayed his. They stared at each other, circling, a circle, unbroken, two predators meeting a worthy adversary, unsure of what to do next.

“They say,” She started, blade still pressed on his throat, her expression as inscrutable as when he first met her, “that it’s impossible to not fall in love with a Faerie.”

The night, also an animal, passes unseen between them. Krennic smiled, slowly, a smile of savage cruelty and immortal whim. “Is that what’s happening now?”

Her eyes says all. The press on his throat weakens, and he observed her a little more closely, watching her desire take shape. He waited for it to take flight.

“At least it’s impossible to not want to bed one,” She muttered, and he laughs, briefly, amused.

“Then it’s your lucky day, Jyn Erso,” He said, benevolently, gaze hardly leaving her.

“I’m still going to kill you,” She told him, slowly withdrawing the blade. It was impossible to tell whether she was simply taunting him or not, but Krennic doesn’t care. She could try again later if she was so inclined to, he would be more than ready to handle that next time.

In the meanwhile, he’ll take his pleasures where he can find it.

* * *

The first time he made love to the strange girl with stardust in her eyes, it was rough, ferocious, pure animal lust. 

It was merely a fulfilment of mutual need, a congregation of carnality, not at all uncommon amongst his kind nor hers. But she was different still, tasted different, her eyes now entirely her own instead of someone else’s, and he absently wondered, fleetingly, what it would feel like to have the word tenderness included in their syllable of sexual contact.

After, they lie on the grass, atop his cape, naked bodies half-tangled together, his arm sprawled on her waist, his face half in her hair. She lay back, undoubtedly content, her gaze to the stars.

“Let’s do it again,” She said, casually, fingers brushing the back of his neck, grazing the small hairs there. He kept his hair short, tucked back, immaculate, but seeing the state hers was in, it wasn’t hard to imagine the condition his own was in right now. Especially since she seemed to have a penchant of mussing it up and pulling at it during sex. He shifted his head, letting his breath brush her cheek.

“Not here, Jyn,” He responded, still light-headed in the aftermath. He’d mostly forgotten the pain of the cut, but it was still there, and the longer he stays in the mortal world, the riskier it gets.

She didn’t immediately respond, instead letting a certain amount of comfortable silence settles between them. Moments like this, he thought, absently, they last forever.

“Then take me back to Faerie,” She says, softly. He liked the sound of her voice. It reminded him of sunlight and days long past. “Return me one, two days from now, I don’t care.”

It was a shining opportunity—the opportunity to trick her into staying for years, decades even, the loophole that every Fae has exploited since the dawn of time. But, oddly, and for the first time, Krennic doesn’t want to do that. Perhaps it was because of the memory of her father. Or perhaps it was because of something else, something that he could not yet determine. 

“If that’s what you want,” He murmured, and she kissed him, softly this time, a lover’s kiss. There was no brutality in it, no burning desire, just a kiss—as if she was just a girl and he was just a man, not a monster, or a force of nature. It was simultaneously everything he despised, and everything he desired. Krennic sighed.

“It is,” Jyn, no longer Galen’s ghost, told him, and here, he felt a strange, indescribable feeling, a feeling large beyond words, beyond even a Fae Lord’s comprehension. But a part of him, a part of him that used to be something else, remembered.

He kissed her, feeling oddly vulnerable, and it is impossible not to fall in love, not with her.

* * *

“I wanted to ask you something,” Jyn says, in the after, their bodies half-intertwined once more, a network of limbs and criss-crossing lines, this time on his bed, in the space that she once occupied, a year ago. She had her head propped up atop his right shoulder, using him as some sort of a pillow, and he was sprawled beside her, his right leg still entangled with her left one.

There was a different sort of satisfaction, but with it comes a peculiar sort of awkwardness. With her, he thought, it was impossible to put on a mask and let it stay on. She demanded a kind of rawness, a radical sort of vulnerability that Krennic wasn’t sure he was prepared to give. Put it more simply, he had not the slightest idea on how to act around her, especially not after sex. He shifted slightly, and she nestled closer, a creature of flesh and blood and raw tenderness.

“Ask,” He said in response, keeping his question marks to himself. It was always better to leave the options open for her, the doors unlocked. She was unpredictable that way.

“My father,” She says, slowly, reopening old wounds. He felt the scratch on his cheek, the cut she gave him, ache. He felt something else ache. “How did you meet him?”

There was a long-short silence in which he recalled the memories, tried to determine how to best convey them to her. She waited, he knows, her anticipation palpable. 

“A town festival. After Midsummer. I was there,” He told her, fingertips unconsciously seeking something to hold on to, to ground him in reality, and found the tangles of her hair. “He saw me. He saw _through_ me. He had the gift for seeing things as they are.”

“My mother always said that he had his head too far up in the clouds,” Jyn murmured, her expression wistful. It was a curious thing.

“Well, she was wrong,” He remarked, willing his fingers to stay. It felt like she moved closer, or perhaps that was a trick of the night. “He was gifted.”

He could feel that she wanted to say something, either to argue or to give her assent, but she let the silence reclaimed her instead. A comfortable silence takes root in the room, and here, Krennic felt content. If he had a heart, if, say, he was like her, he had probably started drifting off to blissful sleep.

“What I said back in the forest, during the hunt, when I first met you,” She started, breaking the silence. “Is that true?”

“Which one?” He asked, adjusting himself, settling, draping his other arm around her waist. She shifted accordingly, letting herself be held. He still felt, perhaps, a little awkward, since this has never happened before—not with such trust and tenderness—neither with mortals nor other Faeries, with only one exception, but it was impossible to resist. Perhaps she knows. 

“That you used to be human.” Her voice was soft, careful, as if she was speaking to something elusive, liable to flee any moment now. As if she was speaking to something precious.

“You asked so many questions,” He said, his breath tickling her neck. Another time, and it’d be a warning. Another time, and he’d be a monster. But here, it was a gentle reflection, a dream unfolding in the span of a breath.

“You only need to answer them,” Jyn continued, the tips of her fingers finding his hand on her waist. “Or not.”

Another irritating riddle from the strange mortal girl, and Krennic turned her words over in his mind, trying to determine whether he should give her the truth, and how much. He let her wait this time.

“I was half-Fae. I almost died. I was saved.” He finally said, giving her the barest version of it, the skeleton, half-dead and had been buried for a century and more. He did not wish to go into details, did not wish to summon the ghosts of his past, the ghosts that he had tried so hard to forget. “Does that answer your question?”

“Yes and no,” The strange girl in his arms told him, chasing after her own version of truth. “I never thought about it that way.”

Her fingertips on his hand was gentle, the barest flutter of wings, and Krennic had half the mind to ask her what she means, what ideas she had formed about him on that strange, remote mind of hers. He could feel the blurry edges of sleep, a strange thing, and it is thus to his surprise that she disentangled herself, for the briefest moment, to climb on top of him, her hair brushing his face. He felt suddenly alert, curious, and she kissed him, like she did under the starlight, and he kissed her back.

“I’m staying for a couple of days,” She declared, ever fearless, never asking for his permission.

“Time passes differently here, Jyn,” He says, in-between the rain of small kisses they were giving each other. Her lips found his cheek, grazed over the cut—he shuddered lightly at the sensation—and continued on its own merry, explorative way, finding his ear at last, brushing the curved tip of it. In the meanwhile he was content to brush aside the stray locks of her hair, resting his lips on the curve between her jaw and her neck. 

“I know. Three days has passed the last time I was here, and that was only for a night,” She retorted, after withdrawing, satisfied, resting her head on his chest now. “But I wanted to stay,” She continued, pausing for a moment. “For a short while. I wanted to…” She visibly struggled with what she wanted to say, and he focused his gaze on her, captivated.

“I wanted to flirt with your secrets. I wanted _you_.”

A confession, admittance, a tiny glimpse of something forbidden, like moonlight on stained glass in an abandoned church after midnight, flimsy and elusive. Krennic didn’t realise it, but he was holding his breath. He let it out, slowly, feeling as if he was witnessing a scene of indescribable beauty. His gaze found her. She was hovering above him, a saint, a sinner, something that transcended it all.

“Like what?” He asked, only half-serious, mostly teasing her. He kissed her first, not really caring about her answer, not really caring about words, not really caring about anything at all. It was simultaneously the longest kiss he’d ever had and the shortest one, too much and not enough. Never enough.

“Like mercy on a death row,” She says, the strange girl with stardust in her eyes. “Like hope.”

If he hadn’t had a heart, that would never be enough.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading, comments & suggestions welcome (including if I should do a second chapter/part for this, help me out pls)! [hmu on Tumblr](http://officialvoid.co.vu).


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